


The painting of Mary

by Icandigelvis



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Ghosts, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-24
Updated: 2015-06-24
Packaged: 2018-04-05 23:05:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4198464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Icandigelvis/pseuds/Icandigelvis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eren moves into an old house just outside of town, which is oddly cheap considering it's size and quality. People who previously lived there before doesn't speak so highly of it and the kids in town whisper about ghosts. <br/>Eren still gets settled in and is quite happy with his new home, until things start to get weird. Like cleaning-devices-thrown-at-him-weird. </p><p>Ghost AU</p><p>AN: Currently cleaning up this fic, second chapter in the making!</p>
            </blockquote>





	The painting of Mary

The house itself was very beautiful, very charming. The front was hit with morning sun, the dew still dripping from the leaves of the climbing roses, making the drops reflect in the light. Eren held a hand over his eyes as he stood by the door and looked outwards. The road was fairly small and if two cars met it would be a struggle to get past each other, the gravel road was in between two flower fields no one seemed to own or at least care for as trees had started to peek above the high grass at several spots. The nearest neighbor was on the other side of the left field and while the privacy was appreciated it seemed a bit lonely. There had been two more houses on each side of this old cottage but both had burned down on different occasions. Enough time had passed however and both sides of ground were growing grass, only remains from some sort of concrete foundation made with rocks was left from the house to the right. 

It was very charming indeed. The house was made from dark stones, having darkened even further by the years and it had a door in oak with, comically, a lion door knocker in the middle. The realtor had told Eren that the cottage was built 1760 and it had been owned by a noble family by Langnar, the daughter Ilse the last one reported alive but disappeared years later, probably from the plague as notes mentioned her traveling overseas. 

After that there had been several owners of the house and it was quite attractive up until both neighbor houses, which both were built later by one family that lived there, so their relatives could stay together, burned down. Around 1880 the second house burned down, unknown reason and it was just two years after the other, but thanks to the main house being built on stone, compared to the other two wooden houses, it made it. 

The last owner of the house died 2009 and it had stood empty ever since. The lady, which had been old had given the house to her son who lived in a France at the moment and because of papers mixed he had barely been aware about the house. A few months back he had apparently died in a horrible car accident and the house was left alone. The state got ownership over the place and after a month of renovations it was up for sale. For six months the house was open for views and the price dropped lower each week, no one wanted to buy it. 

Eren had of course asked about it and the retailor said most people found it to be too far out from town and too close to the forest but not near water in any way so people didn’t want it as summer house either. One family, a woman and her wife had gotten a trial of living at the house for a month but had quit after three days. It was Jean, Eren’s old classmate who told him and Eren had noted to call the couple and ask why. 

At the moment he found the place wonderful, flats in the city were ten times the price and since there wasn’t actually much he needed to go into town for, apart from shopping every now and then, he felt like the place could be it. 

After two years in a shitty apartment east of town Eren had enough, he was out of high school, no thoughts of collage and the money he earned for his jobs online covered the cost of a house enough. 

It was a little too good to be true, that the house could be so cheap without damage, disturbing environments or something similar but apparently it was. The money he inherited after his mother was still on his bank account and he would use half of it for the cottage without having to use his own money at all. It was perfect. 

Walking inside you entered a big room with a chandler hanging in the middle of the roof and two stairs on either side of the spacious room. There was a Persian mat on the floor, at least the size of four single beds. If you turned to the left the room left to a large kitchen, counters spread across the wall apart from the south one where a modern glass-door lead out to the backside.

Going right from the hallway led you into the TV room where the old lady’s TV, apparently ‘an old stone’ had been replaced as the realtor said, excitedly describing the new 60' TV they modernized the place with. Eren grinned as he knew his experience with his wife, his PS4, would be much better now. 

Upstairs there were four doors, well five but one was a small closet, and two were on the right and two on the left. The one the furthest on the left side was a study of some sort, there was a very old-looking desk in the middle of the room and old cabinets were standing on each sides of the room. The man told him the lady’s husband had been a hunter and that the place was filled with taxidermied animals. Eren was glad they decided to get rid of those. The suited man told him they were donated to a collage in another state and that Eren could get some back if he really wanted to, he happily declined. 

The next door was the entry to a library, it was practical huge and Eren had let out a loud ‘whoa’ when he spotted the library ladder that was needed to reach the books higher up. He wouldn’t consider himself short but with bookshelves that reached the roof it was obviously impossible for anyone to fetch the books highest up. 

He was happy al books seemed to be in place and apparently some of them were ‘worth a whole lot’ but since the books were included in the price of the house, 30% actually, they stayed. The brown haired boy wouldn’t consider himself a bookworm but he would definitely go through these books one day, at least read on the back and try to organize them. 

The two rooms left were both bedrooms with king-sized beds, a rocking chair in the master’s suit that was original from when the house was built and a fireplace fitted in there too. The other bedroom that was the furthest out of on the right side was smaller, a guest room Eren thought. Apparently the other families had lived in the other two houses and this was used for dining and daily activities, which explained the only two bedrooms, Eren thought. The man informed Eren, however, that the bathroom downstairs had been the maids bedroom, at least six girls fitted in the small space. There was a fairly large bubble-bathtub there now which was also new for the renovation and Eren couldn’t wait to jump in a try it out. 

He honestly couldn’t see the problem with the place. Again, he understood that it was far out from town but that was it really. Some antique interested people would love this place!

He got his answer two days later when he called the two women who had lived in the place for the trial. Eren himself had been to two shows of the house, one where he ended up coming alone which was the latest one. 

“It’s haunted,” one of the women nearly whispered in the phone and Eren raised his eyebrow even though she couldn’t see him. He was leaning against a green pillow on his couch at his current and hopefully soon not current apartment. 

“Excuse me?” 

“Yeah, well, the realtor had mentioned it as a joke and I didn’t’ think much of it. The first night there was… a lot of weird things happening… I d-don’t want to go into detail but it was really creepy. Don’t go there, if you have common sense, listen to me. They are going to build a factory this summer there if no one buys the cottage since they can’t sell it. I mean you could buy it yourself, sell the books and all but you won’t get the house sold without losing money, that’s why we went with the trial-“

“Wait, they’re going to tear the house down?” Eren interrupted, bringing his hand up to bite at his nails. 

“Well yeah, no one wants the place. I mean the house is pretty but the forest is too close and there has been bear attacks not too far. Unless other houses are built close to the cottage to create some sort of small village it will probably be abandoned or removed. I know our realtor told us about some sort of paper factory.”

Eren felt suddenly felt bad. He even felt protective of the place all of a sudden and after a few more minutes ended the call. He stared out his window that was met with the beautiful and breathtaking view of a brick wall and tapped his knee, biting his lip. 

Yeah, he had made up his mind. 

So only one week later the delivery van with his possessions rolled onto his new property, the old stone house outside of town. It was known as the ghost house by some kids, Jean had told him and Eren had just laughed it off. Jean was working at the local kindergarten and it seemed he really spent too much time with the children because when he told Eren about possible ghosts he looked upright scared. 

“But really, it is actually a great idea, Eren!” Armin had exclaimed beside him as the three plus Mikasa sat at a table in the park, sharing fast food they bought nearby. 

“We could all sleep over at your place and tell horror stories and scare each other, just like the old days.”

“Armin, are you fucking serious. People have died in Eren’s new house, I’m not going near it,” Jean said, looking on the verge to slap Armin. 

“I didn’t think you were scared of ghosts,” Mikasa had then said, her nose still in her German book she brought for some brief studying. Jean stared at her and Eren snickered. Spot on, Mikasa. 

“I’m not scared but I mean there are actual death’s-“

“-oh Jean shut up. There’s not. One lady died of age, that’s it, I even asked the realtor,” Eren said, rolling his eyes and throwing another fry into his mouth. 

“They could lie, you know,” Jean said and Eren just shrugged, he didn’t have time to argue with the other right now. 

“We’ll ask Marco, Ymir, Christa, Reiner and Bert, maybe even Annie,” Armin continued, counting people on his fingers and grinning. They were already going to have some sort of party but Eren said he wanted to have the place alone for at least a day before they all trashed it. 

“I mean there is plenty of space to sleep, right? We’ll light some candles, bring an Ouija board-“ Armin continued only to be interrupted by a stern “Dude, no.” from Jean. 

“Armin, I’m not a pussy like Jean but I really don’t want to scare myself too bad before I’m even familiar with my new place,” Eren said, snatching two fries from his blond friend’s plate since he had finished his own. Armin swatted his hand away as he went for another but groaned as he accepted his friend’s decline. 

 



 

“You’re such a hipster, Eren. Buying this shit-old ghost house in the middle of the fucking nowhere-forest and you’re gonna sit in the attic and paint weird paintings of deformed objects and owls in clothes, or something,” Ymir said as she slid her sunglasses on top of her head, glaring at Eren. 

It was a Thursday evening where Eren and Armin had gone through Eren’s new house from corner to corner, writing things down about how Eren wanted to move things. He was pretty pleased in general with the furniture that came with the house, even deciding on keeping the bed in the master’s suit. Well, at least the frame and roof of it, he drove down to buy a new mattress in town since it freaked him out a bit to sleep on someone’s else mattress that might as well have died there. He didn’t get information about where the old woman went to sleep, so to say but since it was because of age it was probably the bedroom. 

They scooted the bed in the guest room to the wall and carried Eren’s old bed from his apartment to the other side of the room, it looked very out of place with the other old-looking furniture but Armin said it would be great to mix some styles up. 

Other than that Eren didn’t adjust many things about the house, when it was renovated almost the entire kitchen was changed from its original appearance, he had been told. He wondered if there were any pictures of the house from way back but the relator gave him an apologetic expression and said ‘unfortunately not, sir’. Which was a little weird but Eren didn’t think about it more. 

“Ymir, don’t be mean. I think it’s a very pretty house… a little bit spooky though,” Christa said, smiling at Eren. He nodded but was still frowning, staring at Ymir. Why was she even here? 

In middle school he had gotten into a fight with her and lost and since then he held a grudge against her, she was cocky, made references to Eren being ‘a little girl’ all the time and he hadn’t even done anything! He admitted to himself she was a little scary and that was probably the reason he didn’t let their arguments get to serious. What if she beat him again?

“Ah, Christa, as sweet as always,” Ymir said, shrugging. She entered past Eren where he was standing in the entry, holding the door up and Christa gave Eren an apologetic smile as he sidestepped for the two women to enter. 

“Hey, guys,” Armin said, coming from the kitchen. He was holding an apple he probably had snatched from Eren’s fruit bowl Mikasa had made him when she was 8, in woodwork. 

“What’s up, He-Man,” Ymir said, stuffing her hands into her pockets and grinning at Armin who immediately dropped his smile. 

“Seriously Ymir, if you’re gonna act like a douche-bag, leave,” Jean said from where he was sitting on the stairs railing upstairs, staring down on them. 

“Hey, I don’t want your sweaty ass on my railing, its antique oak,” Eren yelled, ignoring Sasha’s giggling from the TV room. Jean laughed in response but climbed down and went down the stairs to enter to the right. 

“Hey, Connie, we don’t want to watch more of your hockey games, turn it off or turn it to something better,” the horse face called and Eren followed Armin into the room, the two girls behind him. 

“Oh, Christa and Ymir is here, can we order pizza now? It’s already 7!” Sasha exclaimed, the controlled beside her falling onto the couch, Connie standing up to turn the gaming station off. 

“I’m down for some pizza, honestly,” Armin agreed, having decided that Ymir’s bad mood would not make him pissy too. 

Connie with Sasha in his lap were now squeezed into the end of the sofa, Jean beside with Sasha’s legs in his lap, constantly slapping her feet away as she giggled and poked him in his stomach or thigh. Marco was next to him, tickling Sasha’s feet every now and then, making her jump and Connie and Jean letting out a ‘oouf’ in chorus as they got kicked or kneed in the stomach. 

Christa and Ymir were cramped into the green, leathery armchair that was fairly big and even had space for another one to sit there. But no one wanted to sit beside Ymir apart from Christa. 

Eren and Armin were sitting in the armchair beside the table on the other side of the couch and Mikasa was sitting on the floor with her back leaning against Eren’s legs. They were watching some movie about tall, blue aliens which lived in another world. 

“No, it’s another planet, Eren,” Armin had said and Eren just rolled his eyes. He had to give it to the movie however, because the action scenes were pretty good. When the tall smurfs started to make out it grew kind of awkward in the room, Jean coughing in his hands and Ymir snickering over in her chair. Eren heard Sasha whisper something to Connie, scolding him almost but he didn’t look at his friends since that would make it even more awkward. A knock from the door had Eren and Jean standing up at the same time, yelling,

“I got it!” They wrestled the way to the door and after Eren paid, since apparently he was supposed to even though he just fucking bought a house, the grabbed three pizzas each. They put them down on the TV-table and were glad when they saw the sex-scene or whatever it was, was over. 

Sasha shot up from her place in Connie’s lap, grabbing a box at random and opening it, almost moaning at the smell that hit her. 

Eren exited the room again while Jean sat down on the couch, the brown-haired went for the kitchen to fetch the beers and sodas he had stored in the fridge, at least Mikasa and Ymir had paid for those and it was mainly the reason the lesbian was invited in the first place. When he placed them down on the table everyone was already chewing on different pizza slices, Eren snatching a box when Connie was reaching out for the last slice in it. They had fucking 6 pizza’s to share, it was enough but still everyone fought like wolves for the food. 

Armin stood up as Eren sat down and he spread out in the seat, earning a slap from Mikasa below him. 

“Don’t take up the entire seat,” she said as she cut through a vegan pizza she had ordered. 

After a few minutes and some fighting on the TV screen Armin appeared again, waving his phone in the air and saying, “It’s Reiner, they won the game!”

Everyone sheered in the room and Armin grinned, talking to Reiner again as he left the room with an eager Jean behind him who was yelling, “Let me talk to him!”



 

“Guy’s I’m fucking tired and this movie sucks, can we just go to sleep, please?” Eren groaned from the chair he was in, practically lying behind Armin’s back, ass against the arm rest on one side and head on the other. Armin lightly elbowed him and Eren gave him a weak punch back. 

“The movie doesn’t suck, it just started, Jaeger,” Jean said from the couch but his face said different, as his head was heavily leaning into his hands, elbows resting on his knees. Marco gave a loud yawn as a reply and Connie snickered. 

“Maybe we should go to sleep?” Ymir said, Christa sleeping on her shoulder. They had gotten 20 minutes into their third movie and all beer cans were empty except for the one Sasha was holding. She was probably the one who had consumed the most food and the most alcohol that evening and with her drunken singing a few minutes ago Eren was surprised she hadn’t passed out yet. 

“But what about the horror stories?” Armin asked, turning to look at Eren who dismissed his ‘kicked-puppy-voice’. It usually worked on Eren but he was so god damn tired at the moment. 

“Come on, Armin. We can do that tomorrow,” Mikasa said from the floor and Eren had almost forgotten she was there in the first place. 

“Okay,” he said, sighing as Jean reached for the remote, turning the movie off since it had gotten pretty loud at a particular party-scene. 

Eren shuffled to his feet, groaning as his back felt like it was made of stone, he stretched a bit, earning a ‘you look like an old man’ from Armin, and went over to the door. 

“I’m not cleaning this today,” he mumbled, realizing the alcohol had actually gotten to him too as he leaned against the wall, giggling a little at nothing in front of him. 

Mikasa and Armin were sharing Eren’s huge, new bed with him. Jean and Marco were on the floor on two mattresses in his room and as Eren exited the room to go to the bathroom he watched as Ymir and Christa who was heavily leaning on the taller woman, went into the guest room. Ymir wouldn’t take advantage of Christa but Eren decided he would not go visit them when the door had closed. 

He fell asleep with ease ad kicked Amin’s feet teasingly as the blond slept in revers position, his feet reaching Eren’s butt and he took advantage of that and kicked him a few times. Eren scolded him and they kept their fighting for a while before Mikasa sat up beside Eren and slammed a fist down onto the sheets, landing on Eren’s shin and he yelled in pain. 

“Shut the fuck up, Eren,” Jean groaned from the floor as Mikasa dropped to the bed again, Armin snickering quietly and Marco mumbling a sleepy ‘what happened’. 



It was two in the morning when Eren woke up, his stomach groaning and aching really badly. He lied there for a while, staring into the roof of his bed, around the room, just waiting for the pain to go away, until he sat up. Armin was sleeping with his arm over his head, like he usually did. It looked like he was scared or was waiting for someone to hit him, but after years Eren noticed he always seemed to sleep like that. Mikasa’s face looked blank beside him, her chest raising slowly. He turned to the side and tried to as calmly as possible, to exit the room. He was tempted to do something to Jean that was sleeping on the floor in front of him, like suddenly slap him, dump a bucket of water over him, spray some cream into his hand and ticked his face, well if he had any whipped cream. 

He considered drawing a dick on his forehead but it would take him hours to find a sharpie that was most likely placed in the bottom of one of his boxes. Other tricks would just make Jean wake up and certainly wake the others and everyone would be pissed at Eren. 

So he just walked past him and into the hallway. He groaned as he entered the restroom because someone had forgotten to turn the bathroom light off and it met Eren’s eyes hard. He relieved himself and washed his hands but as he was drying them on a towel he heard some weird sounds, like people were wondering around downstairs. 

Connie and Sasha were supposed to share the sofa and he wondered if the girl had gotten up to ravish his fridge. If so, he would kick her ass, he thought to himself, turning the light off and almost falling to the ground in the sudden darkness. God damn it, stupid human eyes that took hours to adjust to different lightning. 

There was moonlight shining through the window by his entrance door, just like in his room and he could clearly hear people whispering in the living room by now. He looked around before entering the room and while he expected to see Connie and Sasha sitting there talking he did not expect to see them like this, ever. 

Sasha was in Connie’s lap with clearly no pants on, her back against him and clearly moving on his legs. Connie’s head was rolled back onto the backrest, his face silently screaming of euphoria as Sasha grinded back and forth, gasping loudly, but it was evident she was trying to be quiet. Eren quickly exited, leaning against the wall in the hallway. 

God damn it, he thought again. He didn’t want them to have sex on his couch but it was too late to stop them now, right? He was tempted to stomp in there and throw a blanket at them, demanding them to stop but that would just be more awkward. So he quietly headed back upstairs, finding it more than ever awkward to share the bed with Mikasa now. Marco was awake when he entered the bedroom, he was sitting up and tapping away on his phone, smiling at Eren as he entered. 

Well, that’s a way to have a moving-in party too, he guessed. 



“No but I’m serious, I didn’t fucking do it,” Connie said, holding out his arms and gesturing to the mess of shoes someone had created that night. They were all in a big pile; everyone’s shoes, even all of Eren’s, were leaning against the door. 

“You were the one sleeping down here, Marco was the first one to go downstairs and find it,” Jean said, glaring at the other. 

“Maybe someone fucking did it tonight? I didn’t do it,” the bald exclaimed. Eren groaned and scratched his neck. It was around 10 in the morning and finally everyone was up, however no one would take responsibility over the prank with the shoes. 

“I’m not cleaning it up,” Connie repeated and someone sighed behind Eren, probably Armin. 

Christa walked forwards and started sorting out the shoes, sitting down on the floor and Ymir was soon beside her, telling her to stop. 

“Whatever, no one seems to want to do it,” she said and Mikasa were crouching with the blond too, starting to pick up shoes and untie laces from shoes that were not supposed to be worn together. Sasha’s sneaker was stuffed into Eren’s left boot and Marco’s shoes were a mess, the boy trying to untie them as they were now seated in the living room again, eating breakfast. 

“It was really nice of you guys to clean this up though,” Eren said as he stared at the empty cans and sodas on the table, standing almost in symmetric lines and not lying all over the floor as they did yesterday. Even the pizza boxes were placed in a neat tower. 

“Yeah, I’ll go fetch a bag so we can throw them out easier,” Armin said as he had finished his sandwich, entering the kitchen. 

“Oh, I thought you did it, Armin,” Marco said and Armin just shook his head as he left, passing Ymir who was holding a second sandwich in her hand and sitting down beside Christa. 

“And I though you did it, Marco,” Jean said, clanking his spoon against the edge of his now empty bowl. 

“No, it was already cleaned when we woke up,” Sasha said, mouth full of cold pizza, eating the remains of yesterday. 

“Whatever, guys,” Ymir said as Christa was fiddling with her bracelet. 

“Your house is so haunted, Eren,” Connie laughed and Eren glared at him, rolling his eyes. 

“Yeah, my ghost piles up and makes a mess out of our shoes but it cleans up the cans and food from yesterday, in that case it might be very bipolar,” he said, putting his bowl down on the table. 

The sudden crash surprised them all as a glass Marco had put on the table dropped to the floor, no one standing near it. They all stared at the spot, Eren feeling a shiver travel down his back. 

“Okay that was scary,” Jean said the same time as Eren thought it. 

“It was standing on the edge and Eren pushed the table, no worries guys,” Armin chuckled and Sasha tried to laugh but she sounded unsure of herself. Okay that was seriously scary. 

“Don’t offend the ghost, idiot, it’ll grow pissed and kill you,” Jean hissed and stood up to help Mikasa with the glass shards. 

Eren gave him some snarky comment and telling the horse ‘my house is not haunted, idiot’ in response, but he kept staring at the spot the glass had been at a second ago. It was not standing close to the edge and Eren hadn’t even touched the table with his legs. 



Mikasa and Armin stayed at Eren’s place the next night too, they played video games and even helped Mikasa with some of her homework. She seemed to have a lot of it but Eren knew it was because she accepted too many courses and he just hoped she wouldn’t break down from all the pressure. But this far it seemed fine. 

Okay, that was a lie before, Armin helped Mikasa with homework while Eren continued to play GTA on his PS3. What? They just stopped playing right in a mission and Eren was set to beat the game in at least a week. 

They did a short Skype call with Reiner, Bertholdt and Annie when the soccer-players had time, they were in London, competing at the moment and they had been cheering when both teams won, Annie had even made the most goals in the female team. 

No weird things occurred that night and Eren wanted to slap himself when he was awake, staring into the roof, because he was waiting for them. The glass thing scared him yesterday, the shoes thing was weird too, like they were thrown against the door and Eren wasn’t dumb enough to not realize that if, hypothetical speaking, that if ghosts existed this was a message that read ‘get the fuck out’. 

So what’s with the organizing of the mess they made in the living room?

But the glass falling of the table was still bugging him, he had admitted to everyone he accidently pushed the table with his leg but he knew he hadn’t. He tried to tell himself he did, but he knew he didn’t. 

Five days later and Eren had been living in his new house for a week now, and he liked it. He didn’t know how the hell he would take care of the garden, the lawn he could mow but he didn’t know how to care for roses, or flowers, or the apple trees. There were four cherry trees too in the middle of the flowerbed of orange and yellow flowers, there was one tree of pears, if he remembered correctly, and a half-moon full of a white lilac hedge that circled a wooden bench, two chairs and a round, small table of the same material. 

The front of the house had the climbing roses and the realtor said they didn’t need much caring at all, ‘just buy some flower-nutrition spray and maybe something for bugs, it should be fine. Eren had been aware of that the lady had a cleaning team come clean the house once a week and that they sometimes did her garden as well, he wondered if he should contact the company and ask what the hell to do with the huge-ass garden. 

“Meh,” he shrugged, he would call them when something actually happened, like the roses overgrowing or the trees falling. 

He was seated in the dining room with his laptop in front of him on the table, it was humming quite loudly now and Eren groaned as he thought about how expensive a new one would be. With his low-class electric skills he had opened her up and cleaned out the fan and all, but that was just a week ago and she was already breathing heavily again. Eren sometimes referred to his laptop like it was a human, Mikasa scolding him in return. But he actually made quite good money online, promoting companies, web-designing and remixing songs every now and then. The last occupation craved quite the patience and he didn’t do it as often as he could have. 

He also bought and sold domains, which would sometimes give him two months of a normal person’s salary and Eren clearly could make a living out of this money. His mother’s money was a lot more than he knew and when they were first given to him he had thought there had been an error in the system. They lived in a small apartment together until he was 16 and the accident happened, but consisting of what they bought, how many times they traveled or went out to eat, it was not a luxury life they were living. They were not close to poor, but to receive this much savings he wondered how she had managed. 

There was a sound coming from upstairs as if something had fallen, Eren ignored it and continued typing on the keyboard, enjoying the music that was shooting out of his portable speaker that was placed beside the laptop. The song ended and a dubstep one started, Eren mumbling the words in tune with the singer.

The thing was shut off suddenly and Eren looked up, staring at his phone that was blank. He unlocked it and the music was paused, he noticed the speaker was no longer shining so he turned it on and pressed play again, the next second it shut off again, like it was low on batteries. Eren groaned and tried again, pressing hi finger on ON and keeping it there as he pressed play with the other. Nothing happened for a while but then he felt a coldness spread over his finger, crawling up his hand with a fast speed and he snapped his hand back and the speaker was turned off, this time Eren could see the button move downwards before released and going up again. 

He stared at the speaker for a moment before stumbling to a stand, his chair falling to the floor behind him as he stood with such speed. 

“What the hell was that?” he whispered to himself, his hand clutched against his chest as he stared forwards and then around him. It was like he had dipped his hand in ice water, or into a very cold freezer. 

There was another thud upstairs and Eren jumped, his eyes turning to the ceiling. Without the music around to ease him the atmosphere was extremely eerie and Eren gasped as he heard another thud, followed by another. 

The boy thought about calling someone or leaving his house but he took a deep breath after a fast thought about how that would play out. Eren calling either Armin or Mikasa, crying about ghosts and they would think he was insane, the blond probably laughing at him. 

So Eren took a deep breath and moved his feet out of the room and up the stairs. He went into his bedroom as the door was closest, he checked inside and everything seemed to look ordinary. The sun was shining through the window in the guestroom and everything seemed ordinary there too, he moved his hand and gently pushed the door behind him as he exited but instead it slammed shut with such force behind him Eren screamed. He turned and stared at the now closed door, eyes starting to water. He was breathing frantically and he could hear his heartbeat in his ears like loud music at a concert. 

He opened the door and merely peeked inside, no change and closed the door slowly, his hand holding the door handle hard so the wind or whatever couldn’t slam it shut again. He ignored the thought that said ‘it can’t be the wind, the only window open is the one in the kitchen’. 

There was another thud and Eren realized it was probably coming from the library. He walked past the small door to the closet and entered the huge room through the door that was open and to Eren’s memories, was not when he had woken up that day. Like all the scary thoughts, flying through his mind he threw that one back too, ‘let’s just focus, don’t get scared’, he told himself. 

Inside it was dark like it usually was, there were no windows for some reason in the library, probably so as many books as possible could cover the walls. Eren pressed the light switch he was sure was places on the left side of the wall and his hand stumbled for a while before the room lit up. 

Without Eren turning any switch. 

He stared at the wall beside him and noticed there wasn’t a switch there, his head snapped to the other side and there, on the wall it was, turned upwards and clearly on. 

He then stared at the books that were lying on the floor, he counted seven and slowly walked into the room. Eren heard himself gasp again as a book to his left fell down, he cursed afterwards, a hand on his chest. 

“Fucking calm down, Eren,” he told himself as he was cautious not to get too close any of the bookshelves as books could very much hit his head. He looked at the book that just fell, the title “Jack the Ripper” screaming at him. 

Are you fucking serious. 

He crouched and collected the books, placing them on the oval table that was in front of the fireplace. There were two books on the Second World War, one named ‘stories from the dark’, two fucking bibles and the rest of them horror themed detective stories. There was another thud beside him and Eren gulped as he stared towards the book on the floor. 

The library was designed to not leave as much empty space as possible, it seemed. All walls were covered with bookshelves reaching the ceiling and one double-sided bookshelf was on the left side when you entered the room so you had to walk around the tall bookstand to get to the books on the left side since the room was practically parted. 

Eren carefully sidestepped and stared into the corner where an armchair was placed, a small table beside and a foot lamp that was turned off were placed. The book was lying on the floor just by the chair and Eren gulped as he almost toed over to it, his eyes were on the entry of the room though, staring through the bookshelf at the entry as if someone would suddenly close the door- something, he meant. Something, the wind probably. 

He reached the chair and bent down, picking up the book and staring at the book, there was a bookmark sticking up from the green cover which seemed to be some book in French. He opened it and looked at the note. His eyes scanned the room quickly before he set the book down on the small table and unfolded the note, two words written messily in black.

GET OUT.

He heard a small thump to his left and looked up only to stare into eyes he had never seen before, behind the bookshelf closest to the door. They were light grey, almost white and piercing but mostly, they looked furious, the eyebrows turned downwards. Between the books Eren could only see the person’s eyes and nose but it looked like black hair falling down on his forehead.

There was a slam of the door and then the lights were off. 

And Eren screamed. 



He had stayed in the same place of the room for at least a minute, have falling to the floor and crying loudly, whispering ‘don’t kill me’ over and over before he gathered enough strength and bolted forwards, trying not to run into a shelf as he made his way for the door. But he was most scared he would bump into someone. 

There was someone in his house, watching him. Had he been here while the lady lived here too? Maybe it was just a burglar, maybe the lady had family that wanted their house back. A hobo? It could be anyone, it could be Eren’s friends playing a prank on him, he told himself and that thought calmed him down enough to get to the door. But not without slamming his shin against the table, of course. He cursed and stumbled forwards to where the light was seeping through the cracks of the door. 

He grabbed the handle but the door wouldn’t budge. Oh no. 

Eren tried again and again, slamming his fist against the door, not even remembering if it opened inwards or outwards, he twisted the handle but it seemed to be stuck somehow and he ended up banging on the door again. He yelled in frustration and looked behind him as if something was chasing him, not that he would be able to see anything in the dark either way. 

Walking backwards Eren ran forwards, slamming his shoulder against the door three times before he slammed too hard and his shoulder screamed in protest, the pain crawling down his arm. 

“How the fuck am I supposed to leave if you won’t let me out?” He screamed and banged on the door, he reached his hand up and twisted the handle for the hundredth time and…

… it opened. 

 

He fell through the door as he was leaning too much weight towards it and dropped to the floor outside. Eren turned around and stared into the room, it was empty for all he could see and he crawled backwards and hit the railing with his back. Breathed heavily he was constantly looking around him. 

After a minute he slowly stood up on shaking legs, making his way down the stairs and carefully grabbing his phone in the living room, his bag, his shoes and jacket instead of staying and putting them on. He didn’t even bother locking the door as he jogged over to his car and put it in gear and drove off. When he was outside the house’s property he stopped to put on his shoes but left the jacket on his bag on the shotgun seat, it was too warm to wear it anyway. 

When he was in town, his hands on the steering wheel led him to Armin’s apartment that he was sharing with Jean and Marco, who was the only one studying out of them and was probably out for classes at the moment, Jean was a bartender so he could very well be home, sleeping or something, Armin was an intern at a museum and would probably get hired full-time soon, it had been weeks and he wouldn’t stop babbling about the mummies from Egypt. The blond was going to continue his studies after some time working at the museum as he wanted to get into archaeology. 

Eren parked the car and practically ran up the stairs and tried to collect himself before he rang the doorbell, bringing a hand up to push back his hair. 

He waited for a few seconds but didn’t get a reply so he tried the door. 

Open. 

Entering the place, he looked around and found Jean on the couch with headphone on, bobbing his head while scrolling through facebook. The brown-haired knew so many ways he could embarrass Jean, he could scare him or simply just watch him to see which pages the boy would look up. What if he started browsing for porn, Eren would probably scream in that scenario. 

Instead he decided to be nice and simply walked into the living room and sitting down on the couch beside Jean, not facing the man yet. 

“What the fuck are you doing here?” He heard Jean ask and Eren just shrugged, reaching for the Mountain Dew that was on the table, taking a sip. He grimaced when the not-very-cold drink entered his mouth. Had it been standing there for long?

“Did you microwave this or something?” the shorter asked, turning to Jean who started chuckling. 

“It’s from yesterday.”

“Why the fuck wouldn’t you put it away?” 

Jean merely shrugged in reply as he moved his laptop to the table and unplugged his earphones. 

“You wanna go for some food? I would die for some Chinese right now,” he said as he stood, stretching his arms out above him. Eren took the opportunity to smack his ass before standing too and walking towards the door he just entered. 

“Yeah, but you’re paying.”

“Like hell I am, you fag.”

“I paid for fucking 6 pizzas and I just bought a house.”

“Okay I’ll pay but that’s the last time you get that excuse, we’re even now.”

“Fine, horse-face.”

“You want me to pay or not?”

Eren drove Jean down to the closest Chinese restaurant and they sat down by the window. The place was pretty full but they managed to snatch a four-person table for themselves. After ordering each, Eren taking the liberty to order something really expensive but good, Jean clapped his hands together and snapped his eyes to the other. 

“Okay, what’s up,” He said, more like an order for Eren to start talking than a question. Eren frowned in response and was about to answer with a mocking comment when Jean continued. 

“-because you don’t just show up to our place without any reason, Eren. And you’ve been unfocused since you turned up,” he leaned back and crossed his arms, waiting for Eren to reply. The way he said the brown-haired’s name made Eren pick up on the seriousness.  
Jean was worried. 

Eren chuckled lightly and stared at the table, bringing his hand up to rub at his wrist, his uncertain smile turning into a painful one. Where should he start? Out of all people, was it so smart to tell Jean about the clearly paranormal activities happening in his house?

“Uhm,” he started but was interrupted by the waiter putting down two glasses of coke on the table, Eren thanking him and almost grabbing the man’s sleeve to beg him to stay. Maybe the Chinese man had a grandmother who could talk to evil spirits and she could chase it away and this could be like one of those happy horror stories where-

-who is he trying to fool? Horror stories aren’t happy!

And that might have been a lil’ racist. 

“Eren?” Jean asked and he brought the glass up to his lips, pretending like drinking the coke now was very important. Jean just raised his eyebrow as Eren kept the glass to his lips, the other fiddling with the buttons on his shirt. 

“Okay,” Eren suddenly said, almost slamming the glass down on the table, making Jean jump,” my house is haunted. Like seriously.” 

The answer was clearly not what Jean had expected and he raised his eyebrows before a ‘mocking’ expression was draped over his face. Of course he wouldn’t believe him; he even looked like he was on the verge of laughing now!

“Just… listen,” Eren said, voice hard as he frowned down at the table. 

“I’m listening, Jaeger,” Eren said in a calm voice, sarcastically calm. Eren ignored him and continued. 

“When I was playing music today it was all fine, like really until suddenly my speaker started to turn off without me doing anything. There weren’t any errors with the phone, it was the speaker and the battery was fine, too! It shut of like three times and okay, I know this sounds like it might be something wrong with the device or whatever but then I heard these bangs from upstairs,” he said and Jean slowly nodded, at least having dropped the grin now. 

“and the door slammed behind me after I checked the guest bedroom, like it just slammed shut and it wasn’t the wind! But the weird crashing-sounds or whatever kept going so I went into the library- like, I know it sounds like I had a burglar or something but he didn’t look like- either way, there were books on the floor-“ he continued and Jean nodded in pace with the other, his eyebrows now furrowed. Eren took a breath before continuing,

“So all the books were about death or whatever, world war two things, horror books, even Jack the Ripper and- And the bible! I put them down on the table and then one more book fell-oh and one almost hit my head earlier! Either way, I went to collect to book in the reading corner, you know how I showed you? Maybe you didn’t see it, I know Marco did, he thought it was so cozy and all-“

“Either way,” he said and swatted his hand in the air,” then suddenly t-there was this… man who was staring at me, through the shelf. I haven’t seen him before, I couldn’t see much but I know I have never,” Eren couched before continuing,” and he stared at me, there was a note in the book that said ‘get out’ and then the lights were turned off, I ran to the door and it’s so fucking d-dark in there, a-and I-the door w-wouldn’t open… and I,” Eren abruptly gasped loudly and he looked down to see there was a hand on his, he turned his face up and stared at Jean who looked like he was in shock. Or if he had seen a ghost. 

“Eren, calm down,” he said slowly, gripping his friend’s hand and Eren’s face crashed, he exhaled and suddenly felt the wet drop that fell down his cheek. He snapped his hands to himself out of Jean’s grip and rubbed at his eyes. 

“S-sorry, I just-“ he tried but was interrupted by a warm hand on his shoulder. 

“Eren, calm the fuck down,” Jean repeated and Eren dropped his hands after a minute or two, having collected himself enough to stop crying and almost hyperventilating. 

“I’m sorry I just… I was so fucking scared,” he said and Jean nodded, his hand dropping from Eren’s shoulder and the shorter felt sorry for him because the position had looked pretty uncomfortable, Jean practically lying over the table to reach Eren. 

He didn’t say anything for a while so Eren kept quiet too and soon enough the waiter placed their food on the table and they dug in, in silence. 

“So you’re sure you saw someone?” Jean asked and Eren was surprised from his voice, having grown accustomed by the silence. Nodding, he picked up some noodles with his chopsticks, learning the art of eating with them after heavy scolding from Mikasa’s part when he ate Asian food with forks or spoons. 

“Cause I mean, maybe someone illegally lives there? Like the old lady had family or it’s a personnel to her or what do I know?” he said and Eren stared into his food. He had thought that too. 

“How does things magically levitate or move in my house though? You saw it for yourself, Marco’s glass from the party and the shoes too, that was weird.”

“Connie did the fucking shoes, I’m sure. I just don’t know why he wouldn’t just admit it, even as Christa started to pick them up. He probably got up in the middle of the night, no one would know,” Jean said, unfolding a napkin to remove all peanuts from his food and place them in it. 

“-beside I thought you said you kicked the table?”

“I didn’t,” Eren replied, hunching his shoulders and almost feeling shameful for lying about it. 

“I just said I did because I told myself to, I mean there’s always an explanation, right? I couldn’t find one so I lied to myself or whatever. And Connie was probably up the entire night fucking Sasha so it couldn’t have been him,” Eren added, watching Jean for his reaction. The other grimaced and Eren chuckled in return. 

“You’re fucking kidding? On your couch?” He asked, a piece of paprika sticking out of his mouth as if he refused to eat it and maybe throw up instead. Eren laughed and gulped down some of his coke. Diet, of course. 

“Yep, I walked in on them around 2 in the morning when I went for the bathroom,” he said and placed the glass on the table. 

“You creep.”

“Hey, I heard weird noises! I thought someone was breaking in!”

“Naturally, since you don’t know how sex sound’s like-“

“Fuck you Jean, both of us know I do,” he deadpanned and both went quiet after that. Jean, not even Eren knew if he referred to the time Jean had walked in on Eren and Annie having rough sex at a wild party from high school, where Marco had gotten too drunk he jumped out a window and broke his leg. Or Eren was referring to the time Jean was with one of the girls from their old class while they were camping. He hadn’t walked into their tent but him and Connie had been laughing their asses off and thrown sticks and rocks onto the tent before leaving, Jean was cruel to them for a week after that. 

Or he referred to the time when Eren gave Jean a blowjob at another party after their school had won three prices in different sport activities, it was probably pretty sloppy and messy but Jean came none the less, he didn’t exactly return the favor but at least he jacked the brown-haired off afterwards, Eren rinsing his mouth with beer to get rid of the salty taste. 

Yeah, they didn’t talk about it much afterwards. 

“Either way,” Jean said, clearing this throat and Eren nodding, regretting to have made the comment in the first place,” maybe you should get the cops to look through the place? I mean it’s just weird that someone would live there, there have been guys there renovating the place and such, right? Wouldn’t they have found something?”

“I don’t know,” he shrugged, frowning. This was so insane. 



Eren slept at his friend’s couch that night, greeting Jean absently when the man left for his work. Armin and Marco were already home, wandering around the place while Eren stayed on the couch the entire time, just thinking. 

Of course he could sell the house, or at least try to, hell, he could keep it but refuse to live there. But then again, the curiosity that was sparking through his body was enough for him to think out ways he could try to communicate with whatever entity was haunting his house. There was the Ouija board Armin had suggested when he first moved in, he could get a séance, or a priest to clean his house. Armin and Eren had seen an ad for that once in a magazine and laughed their asses off. And he could set up cameras so he at least had proof. He didn’t know why he was so keen on keeping this a secret, he had told Jean, but Eren simply guessed he wasn’t very eager on being called ‘crazy’ by his friends. Or he was still trying to assure himself it wasn’t anything. 

It would be easy to tell Armin, the boy would certainly not believe him and might even send Eren to a psychologist and so would Mikasa, or she would just go along with it if Eren wanted her to. 

The next day he drove home, having enough thinking over how ridiculous he was being. If this ghost wanted him dead he would probably be dead, with the ‘get out’ it was fairly clear what it wanted. 

The house looked just like it had when he left, the door was unlocked but Eren doubted anyone would be able to enter, first off because no one would even find the house here in the middle of nowhere. And secondly, there was a fucking demon protecting the house it seemed. Or at least wanting the place for himself or maybe just enjoying tormenting boys. The lady had lived there for so long, right? And with different people she had hired visiting every now and then, there didn’t seem like things had been weird. 

Eren gasped as a thought hit him, maybe he brought the ghost from his apartment? Maybe it was angry that he left or something, or maybe the ghost was brought to life… or well, summoned or whatever when they were renovating the house? 

What if there was a dead body tied to an angry spirit here, Eren thought and almost put his car in reverse and drove back into town with that thought. 

However he stomped his foot down on the gravel, his boot crunching the stones. It was till morning but getting close to lunch and the sun was up high, he had his phone clutched in his hand so if there actually was a man living in his house, Eren would run out, get to his car and call the cops. 

His feet clanked against the floor as he entered the place. He stared forwards where the dark, old wooden chest of drawers was placed, an empty vase on top. Eren hadn’t gotten time to fill the empty space up enough but he intended to keep the chest, maybe store gloves and such in it, or maybe plates? No, hats and mittens would do better because he was already thinking of hanging clothes under the right stairs. 

The painting above was more intimidating than ever and he shuddered as he stared into the eyes of the little girl that was seated in the chair by the lilacs, her feet hanging off the chair and covered in white knee socks and small blue shoes. Her dress was in the same color, her bright hair falling in small curls on her shoulders, she looked very cute and even though she was probably supposed to be serious for this photo, her smile was still there. There was an Irish setter sitting on the ground beside her, his fur shining in the sun. 

It was a very nice painting and Eren really immediately it when he first saw it, it had been painted outside with the same chair Eren himself had sat in, which was very cool. The realtor mentioned that it was one of the daughters of the man who decided to build this house. 

Eren took a deep breath before calling loudly, trying to make his voice sound as dark and stern as possible. 

“Hello,” he yelled, both like a question and a demand as he knew someone was there. Of course he didn’t receive a reply. He removed his boots and jacket as loudly as possible, almost dunking his shoes to the floor while hanging his jacket on the coat hanger. 

The bag was thrown on the dinner table where his laptop had died and welcomed him with a dark screen. He cursed and made a mental note to go upstairs and fetch his charger. But first. 

He started in the kitchen, looking through all the cupboards where a human would fit, if he remembered correctly the man was Eren’s height and didn’t look very fat, from what he saw on the person’s face at least. 

There had been no footsteps heard when the grey-eyed man had sneaked up on him though and the thought that the ghost might turn visible when he wanted to hit Eren. 

Huffing, he decided was going to do this either way. 

After the kitchen came the area connecting the dining hall and TV room, there wasn’t much space to hide here apart from one shelf with plates and such and if you squeezed in real tight you might be able to fit and close the door. However it was filled with table cloths and canvases so it was impossible in the end if you didn’t move them. 

He was through the lower floor, the walking closet and both bedrooms when he gulped and opened the door to the library, he immediately turned his phone’s flashlight on, entering the room and turning the light switch. The books were no longer on the table and he gasped as he realized they were put back in place. He waited for anything to move, for something to happen but nothing did. 

“You can do this, Eren,” he whispered to himself and stepped inside, turning and waiting for the door to slam shut and lock itself again but with no such results. 

He was starting to feel silly and checked through the cracks of book, seeing the reading corner being very much empty. He walked around the shelf either way and started at the space where the book had been yesterday, he looked up and guessed it was in place again, probably with the note in it. But it had been for Eren right? Could the ghost write? It looked like it was written with pen so there should be one somewhere around the house. 

He exited the room and was surprised when nothing happened, he narrowed his eyes at the door before slowly closing it. Eren then moved his feet towards the study. He tried the handle but frowned when it wouldn’t budge. He tried a few times before suddenly it clicked and opened, he gulped as he slowly slid the door open. 

It was the creepiest room, no doubt and Eren bit his lip as he slowly walked inside, still gripping the door as it might close on him. 

“Is someone here?” he tried and the window suddenly opened, not fast and loud but slowly the hatch fell off and the window was scooted open. 

Oh. 

Eren didn’t speak this kind of language and he didn’t know if it meant ‘hello’ or ‘fucking jump out of the window, ass-hat’. 

His hand left the door and Eren waited for the sound of it slamming shut but it never happened. Turning his head he looked around the room, the walls were covered in a pastel, floral tapestry and very elegant, the display shelves were placed around the room which had been in use for the animals and Eren shuddered. At least the room didn’t smell of death. 

The desk was facing him with the chair behind, it was empty except for an old lamp on it. Eren hadn’t even checked the drawers but he guessed they were empty. Walking forwards to it he had all his senses turned high, glancing around him every now and then. He considered sitting in the chair but dismissed the thought as he went behind it and crouched to look at the space where the feet were supposed to go. There was nothing there except for a trashcan, most likely empty. It looked quite new and a little bit plastic and Eren giggled when he saw the IKEA mark on the side. 

He stood up and screamed in horror as a mass of smoke was flying in the middle of the room. No, it was more like a thick mist spreading and Eren shrieked louder as it grew towards him. He backed towards the window and clasped his ears as it shut just behind him, the loud sound ringing in his ears. 

“Fuck, calm down!” He screamed, not sure if it even was to himself but when he opened his eyes the smoke was gone. He quickly stood up and ran outside, he hurried down the stairs but slowed down half-way and finally stopped when he was at the last one. Turning he narrowed his eyes at nothing in particular before deciding on the middle of the railing, like someone was standing there peeking down at him as he stood in the center of the hall. 

“You know what? Fuck you, I bought this house, it’ mine, you can’t chase me away! Either you leave or give up and share this place with me or I will bring some priests, pastors and nuns here to fucking exorcise your ass. Hell, I’ll even bring the fucking pope!” 

He gasped for air when he was done, snapping his head around in different directions. But it was quiet. 



A few hours had passed and nothing had happened, Eren was sitting in the kitchen by the small table, eating a microwaved Indian food of some sort. He knew how to cook, fairly well enough, he could make pancakes, he meant, which would usually get rather burned. 

Yeah, he was quite terrible at cooking. 

“Why do you hate me so much?” He mumbled as he impaled a piece of chicken with the fork, stabbing at the food for a while before dropping the fork into the food, both hands grabbing his face. Bad thoughts were growing in his mind and he gasped as a familiar pain in his chest broke out. 

Eren rubbed his eyes before moving his palms and suddenly stared at a note in front of him. It was quiet around him apart from the wind, even the laptop having gone into screensaver mode as he had left it alone for a while after browsing around online. 

His plate had been moved to the side and a piece of paper was left on the table. He stared at it, looked up and around him before turning his eyes down again. Last time he had read a note from non-existing people things hadn’t gone so well so at first he just continued to stare at it, clutching his hands under the table. The wind sang from the window and the note was moved on the table a bit forwards, like insisting for Eren to read it. 

There wasn’t an eerie or scary feeling around him, it was actually fairly calm and the soft sunshine from the windows made the room look very warm. Eren carefully picked the note up and slowly unfolded it, whispering comforting words to himself. 

He stared at the words that greeted him, written in a neat handwriting and in place. 

Eren didn’t know what he expected but it was not this. 

This was a ‘to do list’. 

• Clean up your room. Clothes in the wardrobe, not on the floor  
• There are plates in the sink from three days back, fucking filthy  
• Vacuum the house  
• The carpet in the hall needs to be dusted  
• Water your stupid plants  
• No shitty music

 



 

Eren stared at the note and scratched spot behind his ear, he had picked up his clothes which didn’t take that much time. He stopped to check out his hair in the body mirror on the inside of the door of the wardrobe. His eyes looked rather tired and the rings under them agreed. 

The plates were put into the washer and he had even brought out the trash though it wasn’t full yet. When he entered the house again there was an empty box and an old newspaper lying on the counter and Eren rolled his eyes as he went outside again. 

Watering the plants didn’t need that much effort either and Eren actually apologized to the plant in the guest bedroom, it looked very, very sad. 

Now he hadn’t played any music at all but the two remaining one’s he didn’t look forward too. Vacuuming the entire house would take some time and the carpet looked very heavy, he even wondered if he would be able to bring it outside to beat it. 

“Can I vacuum the carpet too?” He asked to nothing in particular and there was only silence around him. 

“I’ll take that as a yes,” he said to himself, feeling rather silly. 

The smoke from earlier had scared him but he started to wonder if he actually just imagined that part. Eren packed his small vacuum out of the box it was placed in, lying in one of the two boxes he had left with stuff inside. 

He brought it upstairs first and with his headphones on it was quite a peaceful activity to do, he even started dancing with the machine when a tango song came on, he didn’t remember adding it but he knew he had heard Armin sing it at some point, so he was probably the person behind it. 

Eren was loudly shouting the chorus of some pop song by some pop artist when the vacuum was turned off. He was done with all the rooms upstairs and was going through the hallway, soon about to start on the stairs. 

Bringing up his phone he paused the music and removed his headphones, looking towards the machine. 

Eren turned his head towards the door when he heard someone knocking on it downstairs. 

“Oh, thanks,” he absently said as he carefully dropped the handle and scurried downstairs to answer the door. 

“Took you long enough,” a familiar voice met Eren and he looked the horse up and down. 

“What are you doing here?” He asked, stepping to the side as his friend entered, looking around. 

“Your house is haunted, remember? I’m still not convinced but Marco’s cousin had this awesome thing I got to borrow,” he said, bringing a bag up and holding it out for Eren. He grabbed it and found a camera inside, holding it up for Jean for an explanation. But the taller was busy looking around them as is something would fly at him any second. 

“It’s a camera.”

“It has night-vision.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“You want to stay for some coffee?” Eren asked, turning the camera in his hands and seeing the clear button for the vision, a moon on the button next to the usual ‘record’ one. 

“Oh hell no,” Jean said in an accent that made Eren chuckle. Why was he in such a great mood today? Jean seemed to be wondering the same as he stared at his friend like he was insane. 

“Has anything more happened?” He asked and Eren nodded, digging through his pocket for the note and handing it to Jean for the man to read. His eyes moved around the paper, his eyebrows raising high and then he stared at Eren. 

“What’s with the vulgar language?” he asked and Eren shrugged. Jean stared down to it as he continued, “the ghost clearly is a clean-freak though. This would explain the pizza and beer-bottles last time, right? Maybe it’s a fetish-“ Jean said and the paper was suddenly slapped to the floor. Jean shrieked loudly and jumped backwards, staring at the floor where the paper now was lying. 

“Don’t piss him off,” Eren said and bent down to pick up the paper. He was strangely enough growing accustomed to this and even though he was cautious about doing things that would result in him getting… well, practically scolded again. 

“Okay, I’m out,” Jean said and jogged to his car, Eren laughing behind him, waving and shutting the door. The device in his hand felt heavy and he walked over to the kitchen to place it on the counter before stopping and placing it in the fruit bowl, in fear that it would be slapped to the ground. 

“Don’t break it, okay? I don’t want to have to buy a new one,” he said to the room and opened the counter to grab a glass, filling it with water. He gulped it down and turned, leaning against the counter, his pink earphones hanging around his neck. He brought his thumb up to bite at the nail, furrowing his eyebrows as he thought. 

“Can you even be seen on camera? Or will it just catch objects flying around?” Eren asked, at full volume. He wondered how loud he needed to talk so the other would hear, with a person in front of you, you could see the actual distance, here he could be anywhere, maybe even upstairs and not hear him at all. 

Eren had decided that it was the man he saw in the library that day, maybe it was some sort of entity more like who was everywhere in the house at the same time. Hell, maybe it was the actual house. 

He suddenly watched as a rug flew towards his face and Eren yelled, holding his hands up and closing his eyes, but catching it. He slapped it down and glared around him. There was a knock, sounding like it was made against the table and Eren rolled his eyes and wet the cloth, cleaning the table that was already spotless in his eyes, and then resumed vacuuming. 

 

“Okay, now that I have done everything on your list, will you stop trying to kill me now?” Eren asked, crossing his arms as he entered the library. He crossed his arms and sat down on the couch, almost waiting for a book or object to fly at him. There wasn’t any answer and Eren scratched his chin. 

“You know I think you owe me some explaining and efforts on your part too, so my first question is… well, was it you I saw in the library? Black hair, glaring eyes?” He asked, holding a hand up and looked around the room. It was so confusing, talking to someone but having nowhere to stare. 

There was a sudden glimmer by the chair in front of the couch and Eren gasped as he saw the soft picture of a boy, no, man around his size, sitting there and staring at the table. His body was transparent and it was hard to focus on him without looking behind him or… through him. The man had black hair and grey, troubled, intimidating eyes, just like he remembered. He seemed to be wearing old-styled clothes, a white dress shirt with a white cravat around his neck. His frame was small but Eren could see the muscles that the shirt was clenching around. Eren’s eyes traveled down his chest and stomach and observed the dark pants the other was wearing. What was different was the high boots the man was wearing, it looked like riding boots, maybe he did horse riding?

“Oh,” was all Eren managed to get out, the man was sitting still in front of him and Eren jumped when he snapped his face to Eren, staring him right into his eyes. 

“How old are you?” he whispered, not moving at all, scared it would break the magic or whatever it was. The man moved a hand up to pick at his collar, his eyes moving around the room and his mouth closed. Eren assumed he wasn’t going to receive an answer so he opened his mouth for another question the other might answer. He hadn’t heard the man talk yet but maybe he could communicate in other ways, it looked like he could write at least. 

“I’m a lot older than you,” a smooth, dark voice said and Eren felt his heart jump an extra beat. 

What was going on?


End file.
